Malaria prevention in north-eastern Tanzania: patterns of expenditure and determinants of demand at the household level

Mcelroy Brendan, Wiseman Virginia, Matovu Fred, Mwengee, Mwengee William

Description

Objective This study aims to provide a better understanding of the amounts spent on different malaria prevention products and the determinants of these expenditures. Methods 1,601 households were interviewed about their expenditure on malaria mosquito nets in the past five years, net re-treatments in the past six months and other expenditures prevention in the past two weeks. Simple random sampling was used to select villages and streets while convenience sampling was used to select households. Expenditure was compared across bed nets, aerosols, coils, indoor spraying, using smoke, drinking herbs and cleaning outside environment. Findings 68% of households owned at least one bed net and 27% had treated their nets in the past six months. 29% were unable to afford a net. Every fortnight, households spent an average of US $0.18 on nets and their treatment, constituting about 47% of total prevention expenditure. Sprays, repellents and coils made up 50% of total fortnightly expenditure (US$0.21). Factors positively related to expenditure were household wealth, years of education of household head, household head being married and rainy season. Poor quality roads and living in a rural area had a negative impact on expenditure. Conclusion Expenditure on bed nets and on alternative malaria prevention products was comparable. Poor households living in rural areas spend significantly less on all forms of malaria prevention compared to their richer counterparts. Breaking the cycle between malaria and poverty is one of the biggest challenges facing malaria control programmes in Africa.

Informations

• Publié par: biomed
• Publié le: 01 janvier 2009
• Nombre de lectures: 5
• Langue: English

Extrait

Malaria Journal

BioMedCentral

Open Access Research Malaria prevention in north-eastern Tanzania: patterns of expenditure and determinants of demand at the household level 1 2 2 Brendan McElroy* , Virginia Wiseman , Fred Matovu and 3 William Mwengee

1 2 Address: Department of Economics, University College, Cork, Ireland, Health Policy Unit & Gates Malaria Partnership, London School of 3 Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, 50 Bedford Square, London, WCIB 3DP, UK and Ministry of Health, Tanga Region, Tanzania Email: Brendan McElroy*  [e-mail]; Virginia Wiseman  [e-mail]; Fred Matovu  [e-mail]; William Mwengee  [e-mail] * Corresponding author

Published: 7 May 2009 Received: 17 November 2008 Accepted: 7 May 2009 Malaria Journal2009,8:95 doi:10.1186/1475-2875-8-95 This article is available from: http://www.malariajournal.com/content/8/1/95 © 2009 McElroy et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract Objective:This study aims to provide a better understanding of the amounts spent on different malaria prevention products and the determinants of these expenditures. Methods:1,601 households were interviewed about their expenditure on malaria mosquito nets in the past five years, net re-treatments in the past six months and other expenditures prevention in the past two weeks. Simple random sampling was used to select villages and streets while convenience sampling was used to select households. Expenditure was compared across bed nets, aerosols, coils, indoor spraying, using smoke, drinking herbs and cleaning outside environment. Findings:68% of households owned at least one bed net and 27% had treated their nets in the past six months. 29% were unable to afford a net. Every fortnight, households spent an average of US $0.18 on nets and their treatment, constituting about 47% of total prevention expenditure. Sprays, repellents and coils made up 50% of total fortnightly expenditure (US$0.21). Factors positively related to expenditure were household wealth, years of education of household head, household head being married and rainy season. Poor quality roads and living in a rural area had a negative impact on expenditure.

Conclusion:Expenditure on bed nets and on alternative malaria prevention products was comparable. Poor households living in rural areas spend significantly less on all forms of malaria prevention compared to their richer counterparts. Breaking the cycle between malaria and poverty is one of the biggest challenges facing malaria control programmes in Africa.

Background The provision of insecticidetreated nets (ITNs) in malari ous regions is widely accepted as an essential public health service [1,2]. One of the key reasons cited for this is that when used properly, intact ITNs provide almost com plete protection from mosquito bites [3]. Studies have

also demonstrated the efficacy of ITNs with an overall reduction in allcause mortality of 17% [4]. The costeffec tiveness of ITNs relative to other forms of malaria preven tion and treatment has also been widely demonstrated [5 10].

Page 1 of 10 (page number not for citation purposes)